Although a little late in the game, Sony is releasing a digital audio …

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I've always had a small (sometimes cheapo) sound recorder with me just in case I need to make a quick impromptu grocery list, snag a sample of a song that I haven't heard in a while, or create naughty clips of this and that and set them as my default ring tone. It's really quite funny watching people react to it while they participate in a game they don't even know they're playing. Kids, don't try this at home. Subways are WWAAAYYY more fun for things like this.

If you find yourself making thousands of notes on tiny scraps of paper, a recording gizmo may be the right fit for what you need. The Voice Plus digital voice recorder, which also doubles as an MP3 player, is capable of over 500 hours of voice-quality audio on LP, the lowest of three recording modes that toggles between quality and quantity (via Mobile Whack). The USB 2.0 module, which can also be used as a data thumb drive, comes in two varieties. The ICD-U70 and the ICD-U50 will be available in 1GB and 512MB flavors, respectively.

Before you go and pick one up, I'd suggest checking out accessories for the gadgets that you already have. There's no sense in buying a totally separate device when you could spend a fraction of its cost on a peripheral. SonyStyle should have them for US$180 in the near future.